Another setback for controversial university rector

The Third Chamber of Administrative and Labor Litigation of the Supreme (CSJ) provisionally suspended an Agreement of the General University Council of the Autonomous University of Chiriquí (Unachi), approved in an extraordinary virtual session on August 30, 2021, which ratified the members of the Superior Court of Elections of the institution.

The members of that body, whose mission is to set the rules for the university elections scheduled for April 2023, were appointed by the rector and candidate for re-election Etelvina Medianero de Bonagas.

The ruling of the Third Chamber, with judge Carlos Alberto Vásquez Reyes as speaker and the endorsement of his colleagues Cecilio Cedalise and María Cristina Chen, resolves a lawsuit filed by the lawyer and Unachi professor, Absel Navarro, who requested the nullity of the agreement, alleging that the provisions of Law 4 of 2006, which reorganizes Unachi, were not complied with.

With this decision, the rector must designate a new Superior Court of Elections.

Navarro, a professor at Unachi’s School of Business Administration and Accounting, explained to La Prensa that he requested the annulment of Agreement 2, because it did not have half of the votes plus one.

“The law establishes that the members of the Superior Elections Tribunal of Unachi are appointed by the rector, but they must be ratified by the General University Council. The General University Council number 6-2021 was an extraordinary virtual session held on August 30, 2021. I obtained the information from it and realized that they did not achieve the majority or half plus one required by law. They have a practice that when there are abstentions, [these] are not taken into account.

They take as total the votes for and against. If there there are more in favor than against, they approve the agreement, ”he said.